blog/posts/ginibre-ensemble.org

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---
title: "Random matrices from the Ginibre ensemble"
date: 2019-03-20
tags: maths, linear algebra, statistics, julia, visualization
---
** Ginibre ensemble and its properties
The /Ginibre ensemble/ is a set of random matrices with the entries
chosen independently. Each entry of a $n \times n$ matrix is a complex
number, with both the real and imaginary part sampled from a normal
distribution of mean zero and variance $1/2n$.
Random matrices distributions are very complex and are a very
active subject of research. I stumbled on this example while
reading an article in /Notices of the AMS/ by Brian C. Hall [[ref-1][(1)]].
Now what is interesting about these random matrices is the
distribution of their $n$ eigenvalues in the complex plane.
The [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circular_law][circular law]] (first established by Jean Ginibre in 1965 [[ref-2][(2)]])
states that when $n$ is large, with high probability, almost all
the eigenvalues lie in the unit disk. Moreover, they tend to be
nearly uniformly distributed there.
I find this mildly fascinating that such a straightforward definition
of a random matrix can exhibit such non-random properties in their
spectrum.
** Simulation
I ran a quick simulation, thanks to [[https://julialang.org/][Julia]]'s great ecosystem for linear
algebra and statistical distributions:
#+begin_src julia
using LinearAlgebra
using UnicodePlots
function ginibre(n)
return randn((n, n)) * sqrt(1/2n) + im * randn((n, n)) * sqrt(1/2n)
end
v = eigvals(ginibre(2000))
scatterplot(real(v), imag(v), xlim=[-1.5,1.5], ylim=[-1.5,1.5])
#+end_src
I like using =UnicodePlots= for this kind of quick-and-dirty plots,
directly in the terminal. Here is the output:
[[../images/ginibre.png]]
** References
1. <<ref-1>>Hall, Brian C. 2019. "Eigenvalues of Random Matrices in
the General Linear Group in the Large-$N$ Limit." /Notices of the
American Mathematical Society/ 66, no. 4 (Spring):
568-569. https://www.ams.org/journals/notices/201904/201904FullIssue.pdf
2. <<ref-2>>Ginibre, Jean. "Statistical ensembles of complex,
quaternion, and real matrices." Journal of Mathematical Physics 6.3
(1965): 440-449. https://doi.org/10.1063/1.1704292